Wednesday, September 12, 2012
For Ruth
For Ruth:
Along with the article we read about creating student interest surveys, I also took some tips from my supervising teacher as to what types of questions I should include when surveying the students. Along with her help, I came up with 4 questions for my student interest survey. I was surveying a total of 24 kids from our second grade class in Revere. The 4 questions I asked were:
1. How many people live in your house?
2. What is one thing you love to learn about?
3. Where is your favorite place to go?
4. What is your favorite food?
The article we read stressed the importance of having a purpose for conducting student interest surveys. The purpose of the first question is to get to know a little bit about what our students’ home lives are like. The purpose of the second question is to get ideas about what topics/subjects students are particularly interested, so we can emphasize such topics/subjects for them whenever possible. The last two questions provide interesting facts about the students that we may have not found out had we not conducted an interest survey. Young kids really seem to enjoy answering questions about themselves like these.
For the first question, “How many people live in your family?” nobody had less than 3 people living in their home. Most students (8) had 4 people living in their house, with the second most likely amount being 5. The highest number of people reported living in a student’s home was 13.
For the second question, “What is one thing you love to learn about?” the most popular answer was math, with 8 children providing this answer. The second most popular were answers related to reading or books. After that, the most popular answers tied for science, animals and religion.
For the third question, “Where is your favorite place to go?” varied answers were given. Despite the fact that the students answers varied I was able to group many of their responses into categories. For example, many of the students in our class are from countries outside the United States and many classify as English language learners (about two thirds of students). So, it makes sense that many students’ responses to this question were the countries they visit when they go to see family like, Morocco, El Salvador and Portugal. Other popular answers had to with amusement parks such as Canobie Lake Park and Six Flags. Another frequent answer had to do with playing outdoors at parks or playgrounds. And, naturally because many of these students live a stone’s throw to Revere Beach, going to the beach was among their favorite places to go.
The last question, “What is your favorite food?” generated many different responses as well. The top 2 answers however, were pizza and chicken. There was a three-way tie for the second most popular answer being salad, hot dogs and meatballs. Other answers included foods such as couscous, nachos, pie etc…
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Ruth, for the "what do you like to learn" your students responded with math. Math was also one of the top rated subjects with my second graders as well. To be honest, this surprised me. I'm not sure if it’s the times having changed or there are more strategies provided on how to do math, but I remember when I was younger in elementary school and we all hated math. UGH those worksheets were awful! Were you surprised when you got that result for that question too?
ReplyDeleteRuth and Mary,
DeleteI was thinking the same thing. I remember hating math as well. I think the Math MTEL is a struggle for many of us because we are so scared of math even as adults. Many of my students (this year and last) loved and love math. I agree with you, Mary. Math is now taught with so many different strategies and I feel like we reach out to the different intelligences by using manipulatives, videos, math centers, and we share strategies instead of just giving an answer without a clear understanding of how we got to it (like I remember). Great Survey!
Great job Ruth. I love the variety. You seemed to get at least an idea of who they are by using only a few questions. It is such an eye opener when you read about children who live with 12 other people. I was thinking about Math being your most popular school topic to learn about and thinking it could be that way as you have a significant portion of ELL students and 1 always represents 1, while words are a lot more difficult to grasp.
ReplyDeleteI am posting my section of the blog as a comment. I can't seem to do it any other way.
ReplyDeleteI believe that student interest surveys are extremely important. As an educator, I see them as a tool to get to know my students better. As a parent, I see them as a way for my child to be humanized in a teacher’s eyes (my child is no longer just a name or number). Questions from the survey that 19 of my 20 students answered included.
What is your favorite thing about school?
What is your least favorite thing about school?
Do you have any pets? If yes, what kind?
Do you have any brothers or sisters? If yes, what are their names and ages?
Do you do any activities outside of school? If yes, what are they?
What are you really good at?
What do you want to get better at?
Write three fun things you did or places you went this summer.
Please draw and label a picture of your family.
The answers were all over the place. Only three students listed an “academic” subject as their favorite thing about school. Most listed gym or recess. That just goes to show the importance of movement.
Only two students are only children, with the vast majority having one sibling.
Four students traveled internationally this summer.
Things they want to get better at include swimming, diving, baseball, soccer, spelling, writing, crafts, cheerleading and gymnastics.
Every student who answered participates in at least one activity outside of school.
Having it be so early in the year and being in a first grade classroom, I kept my survey very simple. Some of the children had not yet been exposed to surveys so I also used it as a kick-off activity for a lesson plan.
ReplyDeleteDuring meeting I asked children what their favorite season was. They were to choose from winter, spring, summer and fall, and write their name on the white board in the correct column. We then looked at the results together. I had the children tally up and count the results and then answer questions relating to more, less, how much more? etc. The most popular season was fall which has 11 votes, with summer, who had 8, being second. Winter had 3 and spring had 2. The children were then each given their own survey board and a dry erase marker. They walked around the classroom asking students the questions on their boards. The topics included favorite color, favorite food, number or siblings, pets, etc.
This was a great learning activity for the children in terms of academic needs, but it was also a great way for them to get to know each other,practice names, and move about the class.